


Silence Isn't Golden

by Mighty_Ant



Category: DuckTales (Cartoon 2017)
Genre: AU Post In Double-O-Duck You Only Crash Twice, Angst and Hurt/Comfort, Blood and Injury, Implied Violence
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-04-14
Updated: 2020-04-14
Packaged: 2021-03-01 20:55:02
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,941
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23643445
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Mighty_Ant/pseuds/Mighty_Ant
Summary: Huey gets serious about his investigation into F.O.W.L. and ends up captured for his troubles. However, he finds himself stuck with an interesting cellmate.
Comments: 26
Kudos: 186





	Silence Isn't Golden

The F.O.W.L. Eggheads are unnerving to look at, silent and practically faceless in their helmets and opaque visors. Two of them steer Huey down identical gray concrete halls where countless others stand guard every ten feet. They direct him with the occasional shove between his shoulder blades, nearly knocking him off his feet more than once. All of them are armed with large, strange-looking guns that dissuade the idea of trying to run or attack them. Not that Huey would risk either; here, he is utterly without allies. 

Before long, they come upon a sliding door that requires the Eggheads to swipe a keycard to enter. On the other side is a row of holding cells. All but one have one solid wall of clear bulletproof glass. The latter is made of metal bars, oddly low-tech compared to what Huey’s seen of the rest of the base. 

As they approach this last cell, the faint hum of electricity begins to fill the air. A keypad reveals itself in the wall, and one of the Eggheads enters a code that Huey is not able to see. The humming stops, leaving a conspicuous silence. The door unlocks with a heavy  _ clunk _ , and the cell yawns open wide beyond it, revealing his prison for the foreseeable, uncertain future. 

Panic seizes Huey in stranglehold, overriding his common sense, and he makes a run for it. As though anticipating his reaction, one of the Eggheads had moved to stand behind him when he wasn’t looking. They grab him roughly by the back of the shirt, yanking him back so hard his collar digs into his throat, making him gag. 

He’s forcibly tossed into the cell and lands hard on his back. The Eggheads slam the door shut behind him, reengaging the electronic lock. The humming sound starts again and Huey realizes that the bars are electrified, with who knows how many volts running through them. 

The Eggheads walk away, moving strangely in sync and never having spoken a word. 

Huey sits up carefully, fear weighing him down like a stone in his stomach. The passageway on the other side of the bars is empty and windowless, making the passage of time impossible to determine. Strangely, the longer he sits here the more he can’t shake the feeling that he’s still being watched.

Behind him is the sound of something large shifting against the concrete floor. 

Huey whirls around, his heart in this throat. He curses himself for allowing his fear to take precedence over basic observational skills. Junior Woodchuck Rule 346: Always be aware of your surroundings, especially in an unfamiliar place. 

Tucked against the far right corner of his cell is a large rooster, his arms crossed over the top of his knees. His elegant suit is rumpled and dirty and his left eye is nearly swollen shut with bruising. He meets Huey’s gaze from across the cell with dull yellow eyes and the dim light from the hall catches the shine of metal on his face. 

“Steelbeak!” Huey gasps, crawling backward in a panic. He stops just shy of the electrified bars, his heart beating a frantic tattoo against his ribs. He’s never met the F.O.W.L. agent in person, but Dewey and Launchpad have described him in terrifying detail. Dangerous and unhinged, a powerful fighter; the Eggheads surely threw Huey in here so Steelbeak could finish him off. 

Huey realizes in the next moment how little sense that makes. 

Steelbeak was already sitting, beaten, in a cell he can’t use his beak to escape from. As Huey’s mind races with the implications of that, Steelbeak watches him in silence. He makes no move to approach him, or even stand up. After a few seconds, he looks away with a snort and proceeds to stare at the opposite wall, ignoring Huey entirely. 

Seconds tick by, lengthening into minute. Huey doesn't exactly relax but his body does unfold from the panicked ball he’d curled into. When Steelbeak continues to stare straight ahead, he stands up on shaky limbs and walks over to the wall on his right. With the wall at his back, he slides down to the floor and wraps his arms around his bent knees. 

The bars of their cell continue to hum, but it’s utterly silent otherwise. Just as Huey’s begun to think about all the terrible things F.O.W.L. might do to him for trespassing, he hears Steelbeak grunt. 

He turns quickly, anxiety flaring, but Steelbeak hasn’t moved from his spot. His legs are stretched out in front of him now but that slight movement seems to have aggravated some hidden injury, as the agent presses a hand flat against his ribs, his previously flat brow knitted in irritation. 

“Are you okay?” Huey asks without thinking. 

Sharp yellow eyes (technically just the one, what with his black eye) flash up to meet his and Huey flinches. But Steelbeak looks away again just as quickly, surprising Huey when he doesn’t bother with a snide word or unveiled threat. He resumes prodding at his ribs, wincing repeatedly. 

“You should probably stop that,” Huey blurts, unable to take more than a few seconds of such egregious error. “If you’re hurt, repeated stress to the injured area will just make it worse. Junior Woodchuck First-Aid Rule 42: follow the four steps of RICE—”

Steelbeak finally explodes in fury, but it’s not words that come out of his beak. In fact, nothing comes out of his beak; his shout, and whatever he’s trying to say, is muffled by its sealed, serrated edges. He  _ literally  _ can’t seem to open it. Huey looks on, wide-eyed, as this just serves to infuriate Steelbeak further. He punches the side of his beak, the harsh clang of metal making Huey wince. His scowl is fierce, but breathing has gone harsh with enough of a wheeze that Huey suspects he’s still in pain. 

“Is...is there something wrong with your prosthesis?” Huey asks hesitantly. Steelbeak’s gaze bores into him now, his glare silently daring Huey to keep speaking. He tries to keep his voice from shaking. “My mom’s knee jams sometimes. M-maybe I can help?”

Huey refuses to look away as Steelbeak’s hard stare lengthens, though inside he’s terrified. While his Uncle Scrooge would never offer to help an enemy, he likes to think that his mother Uncle Donald might. Besides, if they’re both locked up, are they even enemies anymore?

To his surprise, the impromptu staring contest ends with little fanfare. Steelbeak simply closes his eyes and knocks the back of his head against the wall. When he opens his eyes again, he raises his hand and mimes pressing a button, like one would car keys. 

Huey blinks, uncomprehending. Seeing this, Steelbeak rolls his eyes. He makes the button pressing gesture again, but this time he taps the side of his closed beak. 

He feels himself go very cold as horror trickles down his spine. “Someone... _ locked _ your beak shut?” It’s a glaring reminder of where he is and who he’s talking to. “Did F.O.W.L. do that to you?” He gestures to Steelbeak, encapsulating not just his effective muzzling but his injuries as well. “But you’re one of them, aren’t you? You’re all on the same team.” The look Steelbeak sends him this time is amused, and he sighs. “Right, I forgot. You’re bad guys.”

Steelbeak snorts again. 

“But you can’t eat or drink anything like this,” Huey insists. “They left you without any mode of communication. _ ” _

He’s so aghast he almost doesn’t notice the peculiar way Steelbeak’s hand is moving. He raises his fist slightly, pressing his thumb first against the side of his index finger, then beneath it, and lastly extends his thumb and index finger straight up and out.

“ASL,” Huey repeats, a slow smile spreading across his face. He both signs and says aloud, “You know sign language?”

It’s Steelbeak’s turn to blink, looking startled. He averts his eyes briefly, rolling his shoulders with a sniff. “I know a little,” he signs back after a moment. His movements are a little stilted, and he scowls. “You’re faster than me.”

Huey can’t help a startled laugh. “That’s because Uncle Donald taught us when we were little,” he replies, both signing and speaking in case Steelbeak is out of practice like he suspects. “Childhood is the best time to learn a new language because our  brains are especially designed for language learning.  _ And  _ I chose it as my second language for my Junior Woodchuck badge in bilingualism. How do you know sign?” 

“Learned.” Steelbeak taps the side of his beak. “When I lost this.”

“How did you lose it?” Huey asks. “If you don’t mind me asking,” he quickly adds. 

“Fighting,” Steelbeak replies shortly. He mimes punching an invisible foe, wincing when the movement jostles his injured ribs. “Cops showed up. Distracted me. The other guy punched me into the wall.” He splays his hands wide in mimicry of an explosion just below his beak. “Lost half my face. I had blood pouring down—”

“Ew, ew, ew, stop,” Huey exclaims, covering his eyes. Steelbeak laughs, a strange rasping sound when trapped behind his beak. 

When Huey lowers his hands he finds Steelbeak watching him curiously. “How’d you get here?” he asks. 

“Oh,” Huey says, abandoning sign language for the moment as he wraps his arms around his knees again. “I was investigating possible F.O.W.L. hideouts and discovered clues leading me to Funzo’s. Nobody really listened to me so I decided to investigate on my own. You can probably guess how smart that was.”

He glances at Steelbeak out of the corner of his eye, once more taking in the mottled surface of his bruised features. He didn’t notice before, but there’s blood around the edges of his beak, where steel meets feathers. Possibly from repeatedly punching his prosthesis, as Huey had seen him do. 

“How…” Huey falters, knowing that what he’s about to ask is riskier than anything he’s said previously. He continues solely in sign language. “How did you get here?”

Steelbeak’s gaze snaps up to meet his and Huey holds his breath as he’s sharply scrutinized. Eventually, Steelbeak just shrugs. “On T...I...M...E...O...U...T,” he carefully finger spells. “Offended Old West guy. S...I...C...C...E...D... Z...O..M..B...I..E on me. No big deal.”

Huey only understands about a third of what Steelbeak is saying, but even that is enough to horrify him. “That’s a huge deal!” he blurts, incredulity spurring him to his feet. “They shouldn’t be hurting you or-or turning your own beak into a muzzle when they get upset with you. Even if you are bad guys, that’s just…”

He trails off as Steelbeak’s expression gradually darkens, like black storm clouds rolling in. He wraps a hand with scabbed over knuckles around his beak, his grip so tight the small cuts begin weeping anew. He clearly doesn’t need Huey pointing out the indignity of his current state. 

Huey rubs his arm, a sick sort of feeling churning in his gut. If this is how F.O.W.L. treats their own agents, what will they do to  _ him? _ To his family? His gaze is drawn to the humming, electrified bars of their prison. All of a sudden, an idea begins to take form. 

“The magnetic lock in your beak,” he says in a rush, quickly turning to face Steelbeak once more. “You said it was remote activated, right?”

Steelbeak narrows his one unbruised eye, but nods. 

“That means it must have a power source, a battery of some kind, to trigger the magnet. And if that’s the case, we should be able to short it out with a surge of electricity.” 

Steelbeak follows his gaze to the bars of their cell. His brow furrows as he parses through the unsaid implications of Huey’s statement, and his eyes go wide in disbelief when it finally clicks. He scoffs, loudly and impressively despite the hindrance of his beak, and crosses his arms over his chest. 

“I’M NOT STUPID,” he signs furiously. 

“That’s not what I—of course not,” Huey says, raising his hands defensively. “Just hear me out! With your beak acting as a conductor, we can short out the device keeping it locked and possibly the cell bars, too. We’ll  _ both  _ be able to get out of here!”

That seems to give Steelbeak pause. 

Huey looks back at him uncertainly. “You don’t...you don’t want to stay here, do you? How long have they even kept you in this cell?” 

Steelbeak averts his eyes, glaring at nothing in particular. He raises a hand to his beak again but this time he doesn’t grab it or punch it or abuse it in any way. 

Huey nearly falls over when Steelbeak stands without warning. Sitting against the wall, it’s easy to forget that he’s an agent of F.O.W.L., looming and massive, his sharp, bloody face and torn suit making him the personification of menace. He brushes past Huey, who flinches at his passage, but all he does is move to stand in front of the cell door. Steelbeak glances back at Huey with a question in his raised brows and jerks his thumb at the bars. 

“Y-yeah,” he replies, startled. “But we have time to think of something else. You don’t have to—”

Steelbeak dives forward, aiming his beak at their cell door. The moment he makes contact his body spasms as countless volts of electricity surge through him. He lets out a yell, an actual yell, before he slumps to the ground. The metal bars have stopped humming. 

Huey rushes over to his prone form, his hands shaking as he checks Steelbeak for a pulse. There’s a roaring sound in his ears that doesn’t abate until he finally feels a steady heartbeat beneath his fingers. 

“Wow,” Steelbeak declares, startling him back. His voice is raspy, though Huey isn’t sure if it’s due to disuse, the electric shock, or it’s his natural state. He groans, clutching at his head as he sits up. “Ow. Talk about a headrush, huh, kid?” He stops, blinking. “Wha—hey! It worked!” He grins at Huey, punching him in the arm. “You’re alright, kid.”

Huey presses a hand against his chest, heaving a sigh that leaves him feeling boneless. “I thought I killed you,” he says. 

Steelbeak’s laugh is more akin to clucking. “Nah. First thing to know about me is I’m hard to kill. I’m like a cockroach that way.” He rises to his feet, cracking his neck as he does so. “What’s the verdict?” he asks. “Are we home free?” 

Huey stands on legs that feel like water and approaches the bars of their cell. The telltale humming has yet to return, so he edges forward even more, until he presses his hand against the door with a full body wince. Not only is he not horribly electrocuted, but the door actually creaks open an inch. 

Steelbeak slaps him on the back, nearly bowling him over. “Awesome job, kid. Now if you don’t mind, I’m gonna go find my boss and kill him.”

“What?” Huey exclaims as Steelbeak shoves the cell door open and saunters out with a limp that only becomes more pronounced. 

“Y’know, revenge?” he replies as Huey staggers after him. “I find Buzzard and bada bing bada boom I bury a knife in his eye. I just gotta find a knife first. Or another sharp thing.”

“What we need is to get out of here!” Huey says, hurrying to catch up to Steelbeak’s long strides. He plants himself in the agent’s path, arms extended. “This base is full of Eggheads, right? And who knows how many other agents? We’ll be killed before we’re even halfway there.”

“There’s no ‘we’, Junior, this is a solo mission,” Steelbeak replies, stepping around him. 

“No, wait!” Huey clings to his arm in an attempt to stop him, but immediately lets go when Steelbeak instinctively raises his fist. “I don’t know how to get out of here. If I get caught, they’ll lock me up again or-or k-kill me. If you get caught, and you almost certainly will, they’ll kill you too.”

Steelbeak narrows his unbruised eye. “What are you saying?”

“Help me escape,” Huey replies at once. “That way we both survive and with your intimate knowledge of F.O.W.L.’s operation we can organize a coordinated attack against them.”

“You’re talking about teaming up with McDuck,” Steelbeak retorts. 

“What’s worse,” Huey counters, “Teaming up with Scrooge McDuck in the future to take down F.O.W.L. once and for all or getting yourself killed now for some crazy revenge scheme?”

He actually raises a hand to his chin, as though to think it over. 

“It’s not meant to be a difficult decision!” Huey snaps. 

Steelbeak looks past Huey to the door at the end of the row of cells, leading further into the base. He doesn’t respond for so long that Huey starts to get nervous. 

“Um,” he says. “Mr. Steelbeak?”

“Follow me,” Steelbeak says with a growl. He grabs Huey by the shoulder and steers him, surprisingly gentle, toward the door. “We’ve got hidden tunnels all over this place. Right outside is one that empties out into that abandoned amphitheater on the beach. I’m gonna need you to help me find the right secret panel ‘cause I wasn’t paying attention during supervillain orientation.”

Huey sighs in relief. “Well, you’re in luck! I just earned my Junior Woodchuck badge in secret passage-finding.” 

  
  



End file.
